


the astral plane or something more

by spaceflyman



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Angst, M/M, but with a happy-ish ending ..?, its not all doom and gloom !!, the major character death isn't like .. dramatic or anything it just uh happens
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-03-25
Updated: 2019-03-25
Packaged: 2019-12-07 16:41:32
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 639
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18237524
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/spaceflyman/pseuds/spaceflyman
Summary: Shiro and Keith are soulmates. What other explanation is there for their constant importance in each other’s lives. Their love is powerful and world-spanning, reaching the edges of the universe and then further still. And yet, unspoken.





	the astral plane or something more

**Author's Note:**

> this was a brief thread i drafted on twitter but then i decided i wanted to write it out a bit more which uh definitely shows i think ? sorry if its disjointed (please dont think too hard abt some stuff else it might all fall apart;;;;;; ) also i use too many commas please dont @ me about it  
> also sorry if similar stuff has been written before ! i dont mean to chomp anyones flavour  
> its short because this makes me sad to think about !  
> hope u enjoy !!!!!

Shiro and Keith are soulmates. What other explanation is there for their constant importance in each other’s lives. Their love is powerful and world-spanning, reaching the edges of the universe and then further still. And yet, unspoken. Everyone knows, assumes that any moment the tension will break and they will finally fall into each other, at home at last. Even they know it, but the soft, quiet confession under stars never comes; the first date with sweaty palms holding tight and a first kiss shared on shaking breaths; the gentle domesticity of living together that they both wordlessly pine for. It felt like Keith and Shiro were two lines, forever fated to run alongside each other, but never allowed to cross, to truly intersect. The timing was never right. The infamous, and so very important, ‘right time’ never seemed to come. Kerberos; the war; returning to Earth; the continued work of the Atlas on Earth and the humanitarian efforts of the Blade of Marmora keeping them apart. Time passes, and they find themselves growing apart, more distant, but both still so full of love for the other. The messaging less frequent as Keith’s missions take him further and further into space and away from Earth.

The Atlas receives a message detailing an accident that took place during a Blades mission. The mission was ultimately a success, but there was one casualty. Keith is dead. Too far away to attend any sort of funeral, not that there is much of one to speak of anyway. A senior member of the Blades, one who knew Keith and the other paladins well, makes the journey back to Earth. They bring with them some of Keith’s things, keepsakes, for the other paladins, for Keith, because it’s what he would have wanted. Keith had felt at home in the stars but he had always dreamed of returning one day, when he was older and no longer of much help to the Blades, content with the thought of living out his twilight years in the desert he grew up in. He and Shiro had shared smiles about it, about the idea of grouchy Old Man Keith living happily alone with his space wolf in a cabin he would build himself.

Among his things, when viewed by the right eyes, are countless tokens of his dedication to Shiro. Shiro’s dogtags, taken from his locker after the reported pilot error; notes they wrote each other joking about pointless, trivial things; and pictures they had taken together and with the other paladins. Mementos from events Shiro isn’t familiar with but can easily imagine. An alien-looking flower that looks as though it had been pressed between the pages of a heavy book, probably a gift from a child grateful for whatever Keith and the Blades had done for them and their family.

Shiro cries like he never has before. Keith is gone and this time he will never come back.

The ‘right time’ was something that never existed for them. The ‘right time’ is in another universe, another timeline. One where Shiro knows they are together and happy and peacefully in love. But this universe’s Shiro, this timeline’s Keith, never got to have that, never got to have each other in the way they both wanted. Keith died deep in space, far away from the man he loved so desperately and fought so hard to keep safe, and Shiro dies years later of old age surrounded by friends and friends’ families, but none of his own simply because he has none left. In his last moments though, he feels at peace. His last thoughts are comforting and sure in his mind. That whatever sort of afterlife there is, whether it’s the astral plane or something more, that Keith will be there waiting for him, and they’ll finally be together.

**Author's Note:**

> writing this knowing itll make me sad like fuckin cheers to that bro


End file.
